The Coalition for Better Neighborhoods wants the Easton Area School Board and administration to publicly condemn alleged harassment directed at a middle school teacher who was a witness against fellow teacher Roy Cortez.

Tom Yorty, pastor of College Hill Presbyterian Church and chairman of the coalition, referred Monday night to a letter he wrote to board President Robert Litz.

In it, the coalition called for the board to give teachers and staff at the school an "unequivocal condemnation" of the alleged harassment directed at teacher Sandra O'Brien-Werner.

O'Brien-Werner filed a report about the Jan. 24 incident, in which Cortez is charged with assaulting two students who dropped a coin down his back, with principal Joseph Kish. She also testified last week at Cortez's preliminary hearing.

Yorty said there has been a campaign of intimidation and harassment against O'Brien-Werner for more than a month. He said it includes anonymous petitions for her transfer; "inappropriate objects, garbage and dirt placed in her mailbox" at the school; and the vandalism of her classroom desk.

He said those allegedly harassing and intimidating O'Brien-Werner "could include teachers and staff."

Yorty suggested the superintendent and top administration members meet with middle school staff to remind them acts of harassment are grounds for dismissal.

By not making a public condemnation, Yorty said, the board and administration "placidly approves these acts, giving them permission to continue."

He said students are being sent a mixed message "which gives justification should they decide to solve their problems through violence."

Superintendent Bernadette Meck said the matter has "torn the faculty in half, but we're doing our best to get back on focus."

Litz said the board has not taken the matter lightly and wants the alleged harassment to stop as soon as possible.

It's not easy to identify the culprits, Litz said. "People who do these things are carful. We can't do anything if we don't know who it is."

"We assume these acts have not happened in a vacuum," Yorty said, .and someone must have heard about it.

Yorty also proposed starting a telephone hotline for reporting harassment.

The board did not act on any of the suggestions. After they left the meeting, Yorty and Dean Young, executive director of the Boys and Girls Club of Easton, who is also on the executive committee of the coalition, said they were not happy with the board's response.

They said they came to the meeting to help. "There's a sense that possibly the door was closed," Young said. "We really want to see this stop."

"It suggests acts of violence may be more institutionalized than we realize," Yorty said.